


Somnokinesis

by legaldead



Series: a magicians secrets [1]
Category: Now You See Me (Movies)
Genre: All the horsemen are mentioned, Angst and Feels, Drowning, Gen, Its only shippy if you squint, Nightmares, Only Daniel and Dylan are actually present, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2020-10-25 20:54:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20730596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/legaldead/pseuds/legaldead
Summary: Under the water, his nails drag against metal walls. There is no purchase, no hidden button, or secret compartment that gives away under his desperate hands. It is just the painfully dull pain of nails scraping against a hard surface. The desperate idea of scratching and scratching like you have nothing left to dig this grave with but your filthy wretched hands.Or,Daniel suffers in the grips of a nightmare, without the safety of his controlling nature, and lives out his guilt once more.





	Somnokinesis

In driving school, you are taught how to handle emergencies. 

Defensive driving comes with a number of guidelines, and choosing the lesser evil if a crash is unavoidable is something that you always have to consider. It is better to side swipe someone than to face a head on collision. It is better to drive off the road than to skid off. You are taught how to avoid, and when you cannot avoid you are taught how to escape. 

In driving school, you are taught what to do if you are stuck within the confines of your vehicle while sinking into water. Daniel didn’t exactly go to driving school. 

(He would argue that he knew a thing or two about emergency escapes.) 

(He thinks about Henley. He remembers her pride, her attitude, and how he scorned her. He remembers how her hair was fiery in the right light, and thinks about how it danced in the water like a dying flame during her fish tank act. He cannot remember the exact features of her face anymore, but he remembers wondering what drowning felt like.)

He was one to argue about most everything that concerned his intellectual prowess, including something like this. Especially something like this. He was the smartest person in the room because if he wasn’t then his tight grip on control was slipping from weak fingers. He could never have that. He would never have that.

(He takes a deep breath in and doesn’t think about the water rising.)

He knows, unlike most, that you have a limited amount of oxygen left when confined underwater. 30 seconds to float above the surface and your clock starts ticking to its final sounding alarm. Deep breaths are vital to not waste more air then necessary. 

(One minute and fifty two seconds into his plunge and he can’t hear Walter mocking his watery grave any longer, if he ever had at all.)

He would have to thank Dylan for his father's sensible design in this makeshift coffin. Not nearly as cramped as he expected, letting him wriggle and writhe for escape. 

(Or, maybe he would hold his tongue. Would it be cruel to thank him for the contraption his father died in after Daniel narrowly escaped the same fate? He would escape. He would.)

Waiting means nothing to the slow trickle of water that laps something lazy at his naval. 

There is no point in waiting to equalize pressure when there is water in his lungs and death in his eyes. Doors are never the suggested out to someone locked in their vehicle, but he has no windows to break in Lionel Shrikes safe. He is not privileged to see the bottom of this grimy lake, even as he sinks closer to it, like he might just phase right through and assimilate beneath the sand.

(He thinks about children with their eyes open in pools, grinning through the chlorine and blinking away the burn that comes with the chemical. He thinks about standing within the tides reach; letting the ocean waters rush over him and pull him into the sand, beckoning him by sea foam and riptide.)

He knows there is a way to escape this magic trick. He knows that the water was to his collar now. He knows this. He knows that. He knows, he knows, and he knows because he is the smartest one in the room when the room is filled with only he, himself and his own company. 

(His elbow hits the wall of the safe, blindly searching, and he chokes back an ugly sound when pins and needles race up his arm. There must be some funny bone in his body, he thinks, feeling cold and clammy. He does not tremble, even if his hands are shaking. He is not trembling.)

When he reminds himself to calm down, he thinks about Merritt. He is wasting air like this, just like Merritt when he tries for the hundredth time to hypnotize him into doing something stupid just for the hell of it. He stopped being able to tell if he just hated him or was trying to distract the lot of them around the 34th attempt. 

(He thinks about Merritts thrumming fingers, breathing exercises and the swimming patterns of colors you get when you close your eyes too tightly. He remembers Merritts voice when he hypnotises someone on stage. He remembers the way their body sags into relaxation and cannot emulate it even if he tries.)

Under the water, his nails drag against metal walls. There is no purchase, no hidden button, or secret compartment that gives away under his desperate hands. It is just the painfully dull pain of nails scraping against a hard surface. The desperate idea of scratching and scratching like you have nothing left to dig this grave with but your filthy wretched hands. 

(A watery grave, cold and true.)

Daniel thinks about horror movies and the cliche trope of finding claw marks against wooden doors. There would be no claw marks left to signify his struggle. 

He entertains the building pain of holding his breath for too long. It is a slow thing, tempting and cruel. The build of pressure in the thick of his throat, the desperate need to breathe despite knowing he wouldn't be getting the oxygen he craves. 

He wonders when (if) he is found, he will look as pathetic as he feels? (He is not pathetic.)  
He can’t stop the sharp inhale he takes right as he breaks the water’s surface. He can feel the water cloying, stinging his nose and running back down like snot in his throat when winter comes. 

It burns. 

It burns and his shoulders sag, eyes burning as he closes them and takes another ragged, stuttering breath in. The water sways at his chin now when he sits like this, limp as a rag doll. He kicks one leg against the wall and wonders if he was hallucinating the way they close in on him. He presses the other foot up beside the other and pushes. 

He isn’t stupid enough to think the walls would give under his weight, or rather, he wasn’t enough of an idiot to think he was strong enough to accomplish such a feat, let alone try. 

The coffin he was graced with will not give under trivial means but the burn in his legs is better than the way water dribbles into his mouth if he opens it to gasp in another breath he hadn’t meant to take.

(Was he hyperventilating?)

(He thinks of Jacks excitable screams as he fakes his own death.)

(He thinks about what he would have sounded like if he had actually died that day. He is sure the poor man would have laughed anyway. Laughed in the face of Dylan Rhodes even when the agent tries to save him. Loyal like a dog to a plan not his own.)

(His heart jumps.)

His cold death isn’t forgotten. It plays at submerging his nose, and that is when he closes his eyes. He hadn’t needed them in the first place, not in a place as cramp and dark as this. 

He takes another deep breath and ignores the way water catches at his intake. 

(He thinks about Lula and her relationship with death. He thinks about illusion, and thinks about what she would say if he asked her about dying. Had she ever gotten too close, or did she never dare to try?)

His fist hurts when it collides with the wall, but the overwhelming wave of emotions is more painful than the water dripping in his airway. He writhes against it, anger that simmers just under the skin, fear, fear and desperation that clings to the back of his throat like vomit and the need to scream. He has never felt more lost. 

Are you supposed to feel found when you die? Like ascension is home and you are retired from a travelers work? His knees clack together uncomfortably and a scream bubbles past his lips behind clenched teeth under the water.

(He thinks about how muted it sounds, and is disappointed. He thinks about how it reminds him of covering his ears when his parents argue in the next room over. Is that his memory? He almost dry heaves at the next scream that tears up his throat.)

The water overcomes him, and he lies below it all.

Encompassed by the feeling of floating, his hand clamped over his mouth, squeezing his nose shut. His chest heaves but he does not breathe. He thinks, he feels, he forces the jittering nerves stabbing into his muscles to calm until he cannot thrash despite the desperate yearning to do anything but sit still. Everything is overwhelming. Everything.

(He is Schrödinger's cat.) 

(He thinks about the first step of surviving a sinking vehicle. “Stay calm.”)

(He remembers when Dylan was trapped in this same box.)

(He remembers pulling him up from the depths, how the fabric of his clothes clung to him and how heavy the man was as he dragged him up from the water. He remembers the mental preparation he ran himself through five times over, fully expecting to face the reality of Dylan's death. Fully ready to take the responsibility of it. He thinks about how it would have been his fault.) 

(He thinks about-.)

Daniel breathes.

Then, he breathes again, filling his chest with sharp clarity until he aches something deep.

He does not remember pushing up from the bottom of the box. He does not remember clinging desperately to that last inch of breathable air he would have had left. He does not remember what it would have felt like, cheek pressed against cold metal, no warmth left for him to cling to. 

(They would have found him frozen blue. He thinks about the titanic.)

He is not soaking wet, but he is damp with sweat and sharply avoiding hyperventilating only by the seat of his pants. 

He does not remember falling asleep, but as he wakes up he does not open his eyes until his breathing is stable and his fingers no longer curl into the cushions of the couch he crashed on without his permission. He would rather not face the humiliation of someone seeing fear still swimming in his eyes like the fishes he had lain with in the waters of a nightmare. 

For a moment he is blessed with the idea that he is alone, and then his head drops like a dead weight to the side to see a rarity he found bitter only in this scenario. 

Dylan sat on the floor at the living room table, papers strung about and pencil in hand.

(Daniel thinks about how he could have sat anywhere else. Tables with chairs to recline in, instead of awkwardly hunching over like a kid doing homework a day before its due.)

He counts the number of times he clicks his pen before he looks over, as if the weight of Daniels stare had been too much to ignore. He wonders if it burned, or crept over his skin like goosebumps. 

Their eye contact is minute and left unexplored before Dylan breaks the silence.

“Bad dream?”

Daniel does not let his body sag into the cushions, fingers twitchy as if searching for something to subdue him with. He swings his legs over to the floor, sitting up and considering the way Dylan offered the question like an olive branch. He runs through the list of grievances this truce could be for.

Could it be the arguments they’ve had?

Millions upon millions by now, both small and life threatening on scale. Their relationship was a power struggle, wit and cruelty tested in similar smiles. Perhaps, it was for using them like pawns in his 30 year revenge plan.

Maybe, just maybe, it was for nothing at all.

No truce or promise to be broken. A simple question, asked with concern felt wholeheartedly. A friend worried for a friend. 

He considers telling the truth. 

Letting the guilt he holds behind his teeth spill out like ink on paper, splotchy and spreading around the cursive it's written in. Telling Dylan the nightmares he sees behind closed eyes, or how he only finds death that could have been when he looks back at him with nothing short of fondness. 

He considers telling Dylan how he wonders what drowning felt like when he shares a coffee with Lula in the ungodly hours of the morning, or if anything of this is really worth it when he sinks to the floor all alone in his thoughts.

“I don’t remember my dreams,” he says, instead.

**Author's Note:**

> Somnokinesis: the ability to control, manipulate, and enhance all aspects of sleep; including dreams, daydreams and nightmares.


End file.
